Portrait of a Bookstore

One of my favorite places – and most meaningful – is closing. Portrait of a Bookstore is the first place I gave a reading for my first novel, DEAD WEIGHT. They said at the time that it was one of their most successful events

I love Portrait of a Bookstore – loved it before I ever thought it possible to read there – and will miss it. Our community will miss it. I am so incredibly grateful to Lucia Silva who gave me that opportunity to “go public.” The staff is the best. And so goodbye to another independent bookstore…

From their blog:

After 26 glorious years, 14 of them spent happily inside Aroma Café, Portrait of a Bookstore is gracefully retiring. How could we say goodbye after 26 years of such success? In the words of Orson Welles, “If you want a happy ending, that depends, of course, on where you stop your story.” This is our happy ending. Our official closing date is May 17, 2012.

On May 17, 1986, Julie and Frank von Zerneck, along with their children Danielle and Frank, Jr.,  gave birth to this bookstore, which grew to be a haven, a home-away-from-home, for so many members of this community. One of the smallest bookstores in the world, “small but mighty,” as we’ve always been called, our selection of books was impeccably curated, worthy of the praise of any astute bibliophile.

Their last day is May 17, 2012 and everything in the store is 50% off.

 

Gratitude

The other night, I read a ten minute version of my life at a reunion meeting for a retreat I did in February. As I reflected on growing up, I realized I have a deep sense of gratitude of all those writers who allowed me to escape into the worlds they created. There are many reasons for stories, but escape is not necessarily a bad one.

My childhood friends describe the house I grew up in as a sub-zero refrigerator. Thank you Mark Twain, Charles Dickens, William Shakespeare, Leo Tolstoy, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Victor Hugo, Ray Bradbury, Frank Herbert, John Steinbeck, and all the rest for taking me away when I needed to be transported. Even Joseph Conrad. I did not like Heart of Darkness (the horror, the horror!), but it has influenced so many other works that I’m glad I read it.

Until I thought about my old author friends in this way, I hadn’t really thought about the possibility of my writing providing refuge for someone else going through a hard time. I don’t know if it changes anything, but my next step is to write out my own story in more detail as Jen Grisanti recommends in her book, Story Line.

 

EBOOK SPECIAL

Until May 27, I am pricing all 3 ebooks at 99¢ each! Go Like my Facebook Author page and get the coupons for Smashwords. Amazon should list them at that price by tomorrow. Please spread the word! Thanks so much